Rambling Pete on Walking Places

Loughrigg along the terrace

Date: 15-Jan-2012

Map: Landranger 90

Weather: Wintery sunshine

From the road near Rydal Mount, cross over Pelter Bridge and walk along the lane around to Jobson Close and Loughrigg Terrace. Continue around until meeting the main path up to Loughrigg and ascend to the summit. From the summit continue in a SW direction until reaching Lily Tarn. Turn north west to reach the road near Fox How and follow the lane back to Pelter Bridge : a gentle 7.4 miles as measured on Satmap GPS

It was many moons ago that I had stayed at Clappersgate and walked up to Loughrigg one day. So to complete my walks on this website I decided another visit was in order, this time in dry weather. Having driven up from Manchester for a 2 day stay at the Masons Arms Strawberry Bank, we parked next to the church at Rydal Mount. A nice old church and parking here just requires a £1 donation to the honesty box near the church gates. It does get full though as it is a good starting point for the very popular Fairfield Horseshoe route. Today was a Sunday so I expected plenty of families to be out and about around Loughrigg. It's a relatively easy walk with one steep haul up to the summit and the remainder across rolling hummocks and crags. As it has been cold and frosty this was the perfect time to walk around Loughrigg as the top of the fell can be very boggy - just look at the OS map and you can see many small unnamed tarns in the many depressions up there.

After crossing the main road and the bridge we set out along the lane, and up an icy little hill to contour around the hillside until we reached a five bar gate. A few cars were struggling up the slope and one of the locals was out shovelling salt and grit on the worst patches. She said it had been a while since cars had been able to get up the lane. The track contours around the hillside below Rough Intake woods and eventually the views open out over Rydal Water with Loughrigg Terrace stretching away in front of us and the start of the Fairfield Horseshoe, Nab Scar over to our right. A little further on passing Jobson Close we came upon some old quarry caves that have a small cover of water in giving some great reflections on a still day. There were plenty of families out and about enjoying this walk, and lots of kiddies splashing around - under careful supervision I might add. In front of us in the distance lay Silver How and Helm Crag, hills which surround the lakes town of Grasmere. There's lots of Japanese tourists out and about down at Wordsworth Cottage, taking plenty of pictures as well.

The paths split a little way along and we took the left branch to follow the 'terrace' walk underneath Loughrigg. The views from here are tremendous to the north west looking out over Grasmere and beyond. But soon enough the easy walking is finished and like most lakeland fells there is a little steep climb to be done. The path rises on a well laid path of stone steps for most of the way up, and eventually gives way to grass when the incline eases. Then there is an easier stroll over to the summit trig point where the ground gently undulates, but you can always see the objective. There were some weird lenticular clouds to the north looking like a row of UFO's, quite interesting watching them dissipate into thin air....or did they?

Once we'd been to the summit it was just a case of taking a bearing and heading off to the south west. There are lots of paths over the hummocks of Loughrigg and you could wander around the top here all day and not get anywhere if you didn't pay attention. But the general south west direction took us up and down various hummocks, passing a few frozen small tarns with thin ice. The path took us down past Black Mire - it is boggy in places - and on towards a frozen Lily Tarn. The views on the way down were to Windermere in front of us and into the sun the lovely Lingmoor Fell and the Langdale Pikes. Down at Lily Tarn a couple of little ones were throwing slabs of ice across the ice which made a marvellous tinkling sound, very musical on a fine day. Passing Lily Tarn we turned to the north west with fine views over to the Fairfield Horseshoe, and walked down to the road at Brow Head Farm. The lane was quiet without much traffic due to the icy conditions, and it was easy going back along here following the River Rothay past the stepping stones to Pelter Bridge once more and back to the car. A great little walk with big views to all points of the compass.

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